The casket, the storm...

The formula....

Sunday’s column noted the story of actor Charles Coughlin who died in 1899 during a performance in Galveston. Before his death a fortune teller forewarned of his demise in a southern city at the height of his career. As noted in a previous column, immediately after his burial the Hurricane of 1899 hit Galveston, sending his casket into the Gulf of Mexico and later absorbed by the Gulf Stream’s Loop Current. The coffin drifted up the Atlantic seaboard. Eight years later, fishermen discovered the casket at Prince Edward Island, Canada, where Coughlin once lived. Banjo Bob Cargo’s story noted another twist to this saga in that the popular actor was also estranged from his wife but desired to return one day to a lover on Prince Edward Island.